I smell some baiting.

I'll bite. Hugely flawed. These seem so obvious to me. First, Rand isn't a Libertarian. He's a Conservative Republican. He's also not his father.

"Freedom to sit at a lunch counter." Really? I understand this is an allusion to the civil rights movement. But, honestly, you don't have a right to other people's private property. They set the rules of their property. I don't have "freedom" to come into your kitchen and cook myself a sandwich. Dumb argument against Libertarians. I will come back to this when I talk about the water fountain comic.

"Freedom to access buildings." Also dumb. If it's a public building, yes. Private? They shouldn't be forced to install handicap ramps. If you work out of your home as a private contractor, should you put in a ramp leading to your front door? It's just silly.

"Freedom for females to earn as much as males." I agree. My aunt was CEO of a major clothing company. She did it by working her way up to the top. I don't make as much as her (not even close!), so does that mean she's encroaching on my freedom? Pointing this out seems to denigrate the efforts of the women who have succeeded greatly in business.

"I want freedom to make a living, but BP destroyed it." I'm all for suing the shit out of BP, Halliburton and Transocean. I think they screwed our oceans and need to pay for their damages.

Now, the "white only" fountain. Seems obvious to me. If a racist fountain is paid for by public money, i.e. taxes, then it's immoral and fundamentally wrong. If a racist fountain is paid for by private people and installed on private property, then what would you propose be done? People should have the right to be awful and racist, as long as they're not aggressing on people. News flash: there are racist people in this country. You want to round them up and put them in internment camps?

The problem with segregation in the past, @NetRunner, is that it tended to use the violence of the state to perpetuate itself. What freedom means to Libertarians is life without coercion from government and other people. If the state is taxing you, yet treating you as less of an equal (e.g., blacks in 1950s America), then that's antithetical to freedom. When the police turn high-powered hoses on blacks in the street, that wasn't freedom. That was tyranny. It's really simple stuff to comprehend. Not sure what you're missing.

@blankfist is a shopping mall "public" or "private"? Is a grocery store "public" or "private"? Is it "private" in the same context as my house, my bedroom, my bathroom, my body? I've never understood why libertarians deny that there is a spectrum of ownership ranging from, say the air (the ultimate public property), and your own body (the ultimate private property), with lots of blurry categories in between.

Also, the usual argument against public services, and in favor of market-based ones is that free markets provide those services more efficiently to a community. Libertarians seem to think that we should also reward the people who provide those services with dictatorial power over the people who rely on those services as well, which seems like a bad deal, liberty-wise.

Anyways, I was stopping by this post for another reason. Was going to toss in some high-brow to go with my low-brow:

http://crookedtimber.org/2010/05/25/conservative-principle-and-the-rhetoric-of-principle/

I'm more interested in your thoughts on that, than my cartoons.

>> ^NetRunner:

@blankfist is a shopping mall "public" or "private"? Is a grocery store "public" or "private"?


Did you seriously just ask me that?

Are you saying in a free market, some switch would turn on in the minds of evil grocery store owners and they'd stop selling to certain people in the hopes these people would starve to death? I don't get what you're driving at. Yes, grocery stores and shopping malls are private. I don't believe you're asking me that because you don't know the answer.

@blankfist, read more than the first two sentences, please.

My point with that paragraph was that privately-owned public spaces should be considered partially a public space, and bound by the same sorts of equal access requirements we expect from government services.

Otherwise we're back to requiring the police to enforce racist policies like this. If you're saying a grocery store can be "whites only", what happens when a black guy comes in and refuses to leave? Presumably the same thing that happens when someone enters your home without permission -- call the police, or shoot him.

But yeah, I was actually asking rhetorically. I knew what your answer would be, my point is that your answer is oversimplified, and wrong.

PS: You're basically confirming the underlying premise of the cartoon -- libertarians don't really support freedom, they just defend property rights. You're propertarians, not libertarians.

@blankfist: Libertarian pets

@NetRunner. Propetarians. I like that.

Actually I think most Democrat arguments against Libertarianism come at property rights, therefore it takes up most of the conversation. When I speak with Republicans, it tends to be centered around life (death penalty) and individual liberty (war on drugs) and immigration.

Anyhow, I'm not sure what you mean by privately owned public spaces. That sounds like a lot of doublespeak. Sure, you have to pay property taxes so there's the argument that you never truly own your land, but if you purchase land to build a company on it, it's not technically public. It's private. Like your home.

If some racist asshole wants to buy land and open a racist grocery store, then so be it. I doubt you'd find many people visiting that shop, because this isn't 1950s Alabama.

It's his property, he can do with it as he pleases pretty much. If he wants to open a "blacks only" grocery store, it wouldn't be fair for the white guy next door to stop him. You're wrong if you think you have a right to dictate what goes on in private spaces when no one is being aggressed against.

Let me ask you this. If the religious right was the majority and they voted in representatives that said all homes and businesses must have a copy of the Holy Bible on their coffee table in the living room, would you approve?

By the way, Democrats are making a huge mistake by constantly grouping Libertarians in with Republicans and labeling them nutjobs or fringe. They supported you guys when Bush was in office.

I think the Democrats burned a bridge with a strong ally. Purely speculation, but I think future elections will see another shift in power from Dem to Repub.

>> ^blankfist:

Anyhow, I'm not sure what you mean by privately owned public spaces. That sounds like a lot of doublespeak. Sure, you have to pay property taxes so there's the argument that you never truly own your land, but if you purchase land to build a company on it, it's not technically public. It's private. Like your home.


But it's not private like my home. My home is in a residential area, and is clearly a living space, not a space meant for conducting business. Even if my door wasn't locked, it would be highly irregular for someone to just walk in my front door unannounced without my explicit permission, and started looking through my belongings.

If I owned a store, it would be in a commercial area, and clearly labeled as a store. The door would be unlocked, and it would be fully expected that people would be permitted to walk in the front door without waiting for my explicit permission, and they would be free to peruse the wares on display.

Those are two totally different situations, with completely different rules of etiquette, and with largely different laws.

This is not even getting into the idea that there are so many fundamental services that we rely on that are (rightfully) provided by private businesses, and should be made available to everyone regardless of race, group, or class...like food.

>> ^blankfist:
If some racist asshole wants to buy land and open a racist grocery store, then so be it. I doubt you'd fine many people visiting that shop, because this isn't 1950s Alabama.
It's his property, he can do with it as he pleases pretty much. If he wants to open a "blacks only" grocery store, it wouldn't be fair for the white guy next door to stop him. You're wrong if you think you have a right to dictate what goes on in private spaces when no one is being aggressed against.

How about a "No Muslims" sign? How about a "No latinos" sign? How about a "No gays" sign? This might not be 1950's Alabama, but the US of 2010 isn't a paragon of virtue either.

Personally, I think it's totally fair to stop people from doing this. The object of these signs are being "aggressed against", they're having their freedom constrained, not because of something they've done wrong, or even had any choice about, but because of who they are.

I'm all for the right to "discriminate" on the basis of individual behavior and merit, but prejudice like that is morally wrong.

Exactly, libertarians aren't able to understand that their concept of liberty is subjective and far from universal.

@NetRunner, but why are you making a distinction in ownership between residential and commercial property? Why can't it just be property that's owned and therefore simply private? Before you concoct some exaggerated scenario where McDonalds builds a corporate building in a neighborhood and starts killing puppies in front of the neighborhood children, let's just assume for the sake of argument that zoning laws still apply for commercial and residential. Fair?

When you buy a good, it becomes your property and you own it. If you purchase groceries, do you believe you have sole ownership of it? Or should that also be considered privately owned public food and therefore not really owned by you? See? It's doublespeak.

Whether or not you're selling goods or services from your property or simply living in it, it's still private. I still don't get your idea of privately owned public land unless you're just reiterating what we already know, that Uncle Sam can steal your land any time he chooses. That much I'd agree with.

How about a "No Muslims" sign? How about a "No latinos" sign? How about a "No gays" sign? This might not be 1950's Alabama, but the US of 2010 isn't a paragon of virtue either.

Personally, I think it's totally fair to stop people from doing this. The object of these signs are being "aggressed against", they're having their freedom constrained, not because of something they've done wrong, or even had any choice about, but because of who they are.

That isn't aggression. And it certainly isn't constraining freedom. If the local grocery store doesn't want me as a customer, then I have the choice to go elsewhere. He has limited my options, but so do places I cannot afford to eat at. Or what about private airports? Shit, why can't I walk on the tarmac of the Santa Monica Airport?! That's constraining my freedom, right?! Sigh.

And @dystopianfuturetoday, the concept of liberty isn't subjective. You always say "a cat's liberty is a mouse's tyranny" or whatever. That makes no sense in the context of liberty, because a) cats eat mice where humans don't (typically) eat other humans and b) cats and mice lack reason and intelligence and cannot grasp higher constructs outside of base animal needs like eating, shitting and fucking. Terrible example.

>> ^blankfist:

the concept of liberty isn't subjective. You always say "a cat's liberty is a mouse's tyranny" or whatever. That makes no sense in the context of liberty, because a) cats eat mice where humans don't (typically) eat other humans and b) cats and mice lack reason and intelligence and cannot grasp higher constructs outside of base animal needs like eating, shitting and fucking. Terrible example.


Thank you for proving my point. I would like to add that some libertarians are also quite literal when interpreting metaphors involving animals.

Cat/Mouse Metaphor Cliff Notes:

Cat = more powerful person(s)
Mouse = less powerful person(s)
Eating of others = oppressive treatment of others

>> ^blankfist:

By the way, Democrats are making a huge mistake by constantly grouping Libertarians in with Republicans and labeling them nutjobs or fringe. They supported you guys when Bush was in office.
I think the Democrats burned a bridge with a strong ally. Purely speculation, but I think future elections will see another shift in power from Dem to Repub.


Really? Right back at ya, pal. Democrats could be a strong ally for libertarians on a wide swath of issues, but instead you're constantly calling us Nazis. It's idiotic.

I'm happy if you guys can take over the Republican party, because there's more of a consensus between Libertarians and progressives on social issues than there are between Republicans and progressives, but there's not really been much evidence that you are out there helping pull the Democratic party or public opinion left on issues like the war on terror, the war on drugs, Patriot, DADT, ENDA, gay marriage, prayer in schools, etc.

Mostly your "outreach" on those topics is to say to Democrats "hey, you should vote Libertarian, because unlike those fascist Democrats, we really care about those issues!"

Oh wait, I forgot, ENDA is Employee Non-Discrimination Act which tells private companies how they should run their businesses, so you aren't with us on that one. Or health care. Or Wall Street Reform. Or Cap & Trade. Or Net Neutrality. Or the Free Choice Act.

>> ^blankfist:

@NetRunner, but why are you making a distinction in ownership between residential and commercial property? Why can't it just be property that's owned and therefore simply private?

That was basically my question to you. I gave an example where the implicit social expectations, and legal expectations were completely different, despite both being privately owned.

What is the basis for your argument that they should be considered the same? Do you think those social and legal conventions should change to reflect that sameness?
>> ^blankfist:
When you buy a good, it becomes your property and you own it. If you purchase groceries, do you believe you have sole ownership of it? Or should that also be considered privately owned public food and therefore not really owned by you? See? It's doublespeak.

I gave an example where the line between public and private is blurry, you gave one where it is less so. I said a couple posts back that I believe there's a spectrum of ownership. Some objects, when owned, are clearly close to the libertarian ideal in terms of the benefits of ownership.

But let's go with specific object ownership for a second. Let's say you buy a cucumber, and I come up and stab it with a needle, should the penalty be the same as if I'd done the same thing to your arm? I mean, in both cases I'm damaging your property, but the cucumber will never heal, whereas your arm will, probably very quickly.

In either case, the monetary value of the damages done are trivial.

Should the police treat assaults on property the same as assault on people's bodies? If so, why? If not, why not?
>> ^blankfist:
That isn't aggression. And it certainly isn't constraining freedom. If the local grocery store doesn't want me as a customer, then I have the choice to go elsewhere.

Then the cartoons are totally valid portrayals of the fucked up things libertarians believe. So Rosa Parks should have made sure to check if it was a private or public bus before getting mad about being asked to move to the back of it?

I mean, that's the argument you're making here. On a Metro bus, discrimination is morally wrong (why?), but on a Greyhound bus, discrimination is the business owner's moral right, and should be enforced by the police if uppity negroes get it into their heads that they're people too.

This is the basic problem -- libertarians don't believe that "Civil Rights" are or should be rights.
>> ^blankfist:
He has limited my options, but so do places I cannot afford to eat at. Or what about private airports? Shit, why can't I walk on the tarmac of the Santa Monica Airport?! That's constraining my freedom, right?! Sigh.

Well, the Civil Rights Act doesn't forbid you "discriminating" for those reasons. You can still make service conditional on payment (or not), and you can still mark off "Employees only" sections of privately-owned public areas. Signs that say "No shirt, no shoes, no service" are okay. So is kicking someone out for being a jerk to you, or even for taking too long to order, Soup Nazi style.

It's about taking away your "freedom" to put a blanket ban on people on the basis of race, group, or class, and giving people who've been subjected to that kind of discrimination legal means of recourse.

>> ^NetRunner:
That was basically my question to you. I gave an example where the implicit social expectations, and legal expectations were completely different, despite both being privately owned.

So it's the old "It's the law!" argument, I see. Your reasoning for making the comment "privately owned public property" is because the laws are already in place that distinguish commercial from residential, and therefore there's a legal expectation. Yes, because it's the law. Much like the war on drugs already sets a legal expectation.

Your social expectations you mention had to do with a business opening their doors to the public where a private home owner wouldn't. That's an absurd distinction. First, in a business, it's not open to the public, it's open for customers. They may permit them to browse their goods, but sometimes businesses have requirements before you enter such as a dress code or admission fee. And also locking your doors at night "constrains freedom", right? I mean, doesn't the black customer have a right to come into the white storeowner's shop?!

Your distinction here between legal and social expectations contrast what you say later: 'It's about taking away your "freedom" to put a blanket ban on people on the basis of race, group, or class.' Here again I've argued private land owners should have that right, even if I think it's awful. But Democrats want to argue a moral yarn about private property isn't private because of some social or legal expectation. But when you show how private companies need to limit private spaces (bathrooms, admission entry, dress code, etc.), the Democrats then have to play verbal hopscotch to ensure they take into account how an actual business needs to run. It's lame. Which brings me to the next response...

>> ^NetRunner:
I gave an example where the line between public and private is blurry, you gave one where it is less so. I said a couple posts back that I believe there's a spectrum of ownership. Some objects, when owned, are clearly close to the libertarian ideal in terms of the benefits of ownership.

But who decides? This is another Democratic fallacy. You guys want a Utopia and want to meddle in all aspects of human life, but you're never practical about it. Your rules are more complicated than mapping the genome.

>> ^NetRunner:
I mean, that's the argument you're making here. On a Metro bus, discrimination is morally wrong (why?), but on a Greyhound bus, discrimination is the business owner's moral right, and should be enforced by the police if uppity negroes get it into their heads that they're people too.

Here again the Democrats believe the civil rights movement boiled down to a resistance against private business owners. Segregation was a much larger issue in America than that. Blacks were treated differently in armed forces, they weren't allowed to hold government jobs like policeman and firefighters, they were forced to go to substandard segregated public schools, and the corrupt justice system wouldn't give them a fair trial.

But that won't stop the Democrats from blaming private business for the civil rights movement. Damn history when you have political opinion.

We should'nt require a civil rights act in a free society, but the pressures of racism in a community government proved to embolden the democratic voice of the people much like the gays in California were recently silenced because of your precious democracy.

"Property is impossible"
"Property is theft"
"Property is freedom."
-Proudhon

@blankfist, you're not responding to the points I made.

In the first quoted section, I'm not making the "it's the law, so it's right" argument, I'm saying "we already have a formal, legal definition of the difference that makes sense to me and most people, what's the reason for changing it?" I further went on to provide examples where the same behavior get treated very differently today, and you decline to answer whether you think the law should be somehow normalized in that example.

In the second quoted section, again you don't actually make an argument for me being wrong in any way, nor respond to my example, you just declare that I am suffering from a "Democratic fallacy" (I don't think that word means what you think it means), and then go on to both make a straw man ("[You] want to meddle in all aspects of human life"), and a fallacious argument against it (i.e. your viewpoint is simpler, so it should be right).

In the third, I'm not making an argument about the historical facts surrounding Rosa Parks, I'm making the argument that if this is a moral argument, and that morality dictates that private discrimination is okay, while public discrimination is not, then Libertarian Rosa Parks needed to check and see who owns the bus (the City, or a private company) before she refuses to go to the back of the bus, because otherwise she's making a fuss about something she has no moral right to refuse to comply to, just the right to find another bus if she doesn't like it.

In fact, you are saying that to defend freedom, we should be willing to give our lives to defend the right of the bus owner to make black people get to the back of the bus, even if we think it's wrong (but that we shouldn't think it's wrong, because morally, property rights are all that matter).

The US tried blankfists idea of of "private business" rights for 100 years and it failed horribly. It took the Civil Rights Act to correct how bloody wrong it turned out to be.

I guess it's time for every one to have that bar-code and government issued cars now. I mean, shit, since free market failed.

I suppose it's time we just let the government decide every, fucking, thing. I mean look at the "cracker-jack job" they did with Iraq, the bailout and, fuck, the oil spill too.

Fuck it let 'em own the markets, they'd love the power to go to war at a whim; wait they already do.

Every one in here is missing the fucking point. There are three evils that influence the government; Bankers, the Military Industrial Complex, and the Big fucking Business. There comes a point in time when an organization becomes so big that it fails to see the negative effects it is causing, I'm looking at you British Petroleum or better known as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company and you Wall Street. The previous list can go on and on.

This whole; party, free market, regulated market, class warfare and the rest are all things that keep the people from seeing the real problem; lobbyists, and corrupt officials. The whole culture of government needs to change.

Partisan politics, keep fucking that chicken.

>> ^volumptuous:

The US tried blankfists idea of of "private business" rights for 100 years and it failed horribly. It took the Civil Rights Act to correct how bloody wrong it turned out to be.

Did it fail horribly? Do you know how many black business owners lost their businesses when black/white integration began? The thing is, it worked on a private business level. There were black businesses and their were white businesses. Both had a niche and both made money. As f*cked up as it sounds, shit worked on those terms. I feel like the civil rights movement wasn't just about segregation, but about social awareness. I think democrat or libertarian could agree that the freedom to have your voice heard so that you may change things is a good thing

They should have had "No terrorists allowed" on the twin towers, that would have fixed it.

>> ^NordlichReiter:
Every one in here is missing the fucking point. There are three evils that influence the government; Bankers, the Military Industrial Complex, and the Big fucking Business.

Partisan politics. Keep fucking that chicken.


It's true, BF, NR and I fill up threads with a partisan back and forth that - while fun - goes nowhere. I'm never going to convince blanco that taxes are not theft, and blankfist is never going to convince me that the free market has anything to do with liberty. But, we do have common enemies: banks, the military industrial complex, big oil and big business in general.

What if we joined forces? Why don't we 4 little fleas start a movement? We could do it right here.

I don't get the black and white proposed when discussing law of businesses vs people. I think it's a businesses right to refuse business to anybody based on any criteria they choose. If they want to be racist that's fine, it's not illegal for an individual to do that, it shouldn't be illegal for a business to do it. I DO think that if a business is doing something illegal though, such as illegal dumping, murdering people, punching babies in the face, etc., they need to be punished. I don't think the government enforcing a law for corporations is any different than the government enforcing laws for people. I can be racist, but I can't punch a Guadalajarian maid in the knee caps. I can't dump toxic waste into the water, neither should DOW chemicals. I don't see the problem here. There's an easily distinguishable line.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday: I'm never going to convince blanco...


I'll give it a shot.

blankfist, you mentioned that zoning laws are what prevent McDonalds from setting up their corporate headquarters in a residential neighborhood. And you mentioned that as an absurdly extreme example of people doing whatever they want with their (land) property. I'm glad that you recognize it as absurd, because that implies that you also acknowledge that there are in fact sound legal limits to what a property owner may or may not do with their property, like storing nuclear waste in one's basement, or failing to cut one's grass and generally keep one's home from looking abandoned (blight). What is the legal basis for such laws if property rights are supposed to be absolute? The short answer is that they are not absolute - there are all sorts of restrictions on property rights, especially in the case of land.

But even if, for the sake of argument, I allow that property rights were absolute in the sense I think you're intending, one of the main legal bases for zoning restritctions is because it would infringe on the property rights of others, by lowering the value of their property. That same argument can be (and often is) applied to businesses. That's why strip clubs and porn shops can't be located wherever their owners would like. There are more mundane examples as well, such as the restriction on putting a big box store in the middle of a light commerical/residential mixed area. The exact same legal reasoning can be applied to the practice of discrimination of customers. By allowing a grocery store owner to hang a "whites only" sign in his window, it damages any neighboring businesses, and reduces neighboring property values in general.

That legal argument may ignore the morally repugnant aspects of discrimination, and would probably never be used in practice - it was just for the sake of argument given the premise of nearly absolute property rights. The more appropriate answer is what I mentioned above - property rights aren't even close to absolute, and the property rights of business owner's are routinely more restricted than those of private residences. The reason for that is because despite an ever growing number of Supreme Court decisions giving more and more individual rights to businesses, we're still not quite to the point of corporate citizenship.

Well, there goes my dream of Baby Punchers 'R Us.
>> ^rottenseed:

I don't get the black and white proposed when discussing law of businesses vs people. I think it's a businesses right to refuse business to anybody based on any criteria they choose. If they want to be racist that's fine, it's not illegal for an individual to do that, it shouldn't be illegal for a business to do it. I DO think that if a business is doing something illegal though, such as illegal dumping, murdering people, punching babies in the face, etc., they need to be punished. I don't think the government enforcing a law for corporations is any different than the government enforcing laws for people. I can be racist, but I can't punch a Guadalajarian maid in the knee caps. I can't dump toxic waste into the water, neither should DOW chemicals. I don't see the problem here. There's an easily distinguishable line.

@jonny. Spider-man, you're drunk.

I only agreed about commercial vs. residential zoning because I was afraid it would derail NR and my conversation earlier. But now? I will say I disagree with zoning because it limits a property owner's right to choose what he wants to do with his property.

If McDonalds opened a corporate office next door to my home, I'd not like it, but I don't think there's much I should be able to do about it. It gets weird because to me McDonalds is a corporation, thus a private entity given validation by government, so in a way it's kind of public. I don't know, it's hard to artfully explain how I feel about that. Still, if a private business opened next door to me, that would be fine as long as they didn't reasonably do things to encroach on my well being or destroy my property. If they installed lights that shined in my window at night, I could reasonably argue in court that it keeps me awake at night and I could seek damages. That is if you could actually sue a fucking corporation.

I disagree that not cutting your grass or opening a porn shop infringes on other people's property rights. The argument that someone's property value drops is valid, but I don't personally believe the perceived value of someone's property in relation to what someone else does with their property is something that should be regulated or legislated unless the property owner voluntarily signed an agreement agreeing to do so.

However, if there's a realistic and reasonable threat to your life caused by careless activities of a property owner, such as building a nuclear bomb in his basement, then I think it's more than reasonable for the community to take action against him. But barring some unrealistic event such as building a nuclear bomb in his basement, I do believe a man (or woman) should be left to freely do with their property what they see fit.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
What if we joined forces? Why don't we 4 little fleas start a movement? We could do it right here.


I'm all for it. Except...what exactly would the movement be about?

When I shout "WHAT DO WE WANT?" What's the callback?

>> ^blankfist:

I disagree that not cutting your grass or opening a porn shop infringes on other people's property rights. The argument that someone's property value drops is valid, but I don't personally believe the perceived value of someone's property in relation to what someone else does with their property is something that should be regulated or legislated unless the property owner voluntarily signed an agreement agreeing to do so.

Hi, I've just been hired by BP's legal team, and we'd like to talk with you about trying to get you elected to the Louisiana Supreme Court.

See, we were doing something with our own property that, well, just so happens to have accidentally had a detrimental effect on the value of the surrounding people's property.

We don't really think it's fair that anyone ask us to stop, or compensate them for what we did, because after all, we were just exercising our right to do what we want on our own property. We're clearly not threatening any person's life, so what's the harm?

[rips fake mustache from NetRunner's face]

I knew you weren't form BP's legal team!

Weiners will be rubbed. >> ^NetRunner:

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
What if we joined forces? Why don't we 4 little fleas start a movement? We could do it right here.

I'm all for it. Except...what exactly would the movement be about?
When I shout "WHAT DO WE WANT?" What's the callback?

I've got my wiener out. Head rubs only!

>> ^NetRunner:

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
What if we joined forces? Why don't we 4 little fleas start a movement? We could do it right here.

I'm all for it. Except...what exactly would the movement be about?
When I shout "WHAT DO WE WANT?" What's the callback?


We should keep it simple. I suggest the going after military spending, which is probably the one thing we all agree on most. Think of all the money that goes towards building new, exotic and sexy ways of killing people, futile wars in the middle east, military aid to violent and oppressive nations, propping up corrupt dictators and regimes, WW2 era bases in Japan and Germany. Wasteful and counterproductive at a time when people are hurting in this country. I do not wish to take anything away from the soldiers, no pay cuts or cuts in medical or retirement benefits.

Is this something we can all get on board with?

What do we want? A government that works for the people, not war industry!

>> ^blankfist:

[rips fake mustache from NetRunner's face]
I knew you weren't form BP's legal team!


And I woulda gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling kids!

But in order to achieve that, DFT, I think we have to get away from the Republicans and Democrats because as a large unit they've routinely propped up the military industrial complex. Nonpartisan, baby! Nonpartisan!

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

We should keep it simple. I suggest the going after military spending, which is probably the one thing we all agree on most.

I guess I was trying to think of some way to unify us on anti-corporatism.

Military spending cuts will be a monumentally hard sell when we are still engaged in combat in 2-3 countries, with conservative media still fearmongering 24/7, and Democrats afraid to appear "soft on terror", and members of both parties in love with the military pork.

I think one libertarian idea I can really get behind as a solution to corporate recklessness is a campaign to eliminate all statutory liability limits. We can sell it to the right-leaning amongst us as a chance to see if that alone makes regulation superfluous, and lets them show us hippies that our meddling isn't needed, while telling our left-leaners that it's a great way to make Lloyd Blankfein penniless, and erase BP from the face of the earth.

It seems to me that might be a legislative proposal populists from both ends of the spectrum could support.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Unless you are going on a small handful of issues, I don't see how progressive types could form a coalition with the Libertarian minded. Just seem to be way too many fundamental philosophical issues. However, I think the US would be served by a multi-party system that required factions to seek allies on key issues. The duopoly of the major parties really does exist.

The fierce jousting you see on TV is the greatest show on Earth, and a farce. They all go to the same country clubs and eat from the same pork troughs. Throw the bums out.

OK, anti-corporatism works for me as well.

"Rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble!"
>> ^NetRunner:
When I shout "WHAT DO WE WANT?" What's the callback?

>> ^dag:

Unless you are going on a small handful of issues, I don't see how progressive types could form a coalition with the Libertarian minded. Just seem to be way too many fundamental philosophical issues.

The sad thing is, libertarians at least claim to be on the same side as liberals in terms of what issues we need to solve.

We both want to stop wars and shrink the military.

We both want to legalize drugs.

We both want to stop discriminatory practices.

We both want to help the poor.

We both want to defend the legal rights of people accused of crimes.

We both want to stop our massive expansion of incarceration.

We both want to defend the separation of church and state.

We both want to protect the environment.

We both want to stop corruption, public and private.

The problem seems to be that they've gotten snookered by a secular religion that says taxes and laws are the devil, and that fighting against them overrides all other considerations.

We want a lot of the same things, but your list isn't exactly accurate from my perspective, @NetRunner.

We certainly want to shrink the military and end the senseless wars abroad. Check. I'd even go one step further and say we should close down any base or military occupation in the 130 countries overseas. Military should be used for defense, not offense.

We don't want to "legalize" drugs, we want them to be neither illegal or legal. But most of us will take legalization for now.

We want to stop discriminatory practices, but by way of persuasion not force.

We certainly want to help the poor, just not funded by theft.

Defending legal rights of people accused of crimes. Check.

Stopping expansion of incarceration. Check.

Separation of church and state. Check.

We certainly want to protect the environment, but we don't want the cult of greendom to use force upon each of us to do it. Forcing a ban on bottled water = bad. Forcing BP to pay for their colossal fuck up = good.

Stopping corruption, public and private. Also you left out "fraud". We'd like to "stop" that, too. Though the term stop makes us suspicious, because prevention seems to have a preemptive ring to it. How about we protect people from the damages of corruption and fraud by using rule of law?

Sounds like we have some common ground here.

I didn't read every comment, so I'm sorry if I missed a similar question.

Where do Libertarians stand on private ownership of immensely dangerous property? Should I be allowed to manufacture large amounts of chemical weapons in my home?

Maybe my containment system isn't up to spec, but so far none of it has leaked out. If there is a breach and it kills a few thousand people then I'd probably go to jail, but until that happens wouldn't I just be exercising my freedom to own property?

@Psychologic, I did touch on that here.

But here's a more thought out Libertarian position on nuclear weapon ownership:
http://www.bestsyndication.com/2005/A-H/DAVIS-Mike/112505_nuclear_weapons.htm

An excerpt from that article: "Libertarianism implies simply that nuclear weapons, along with all weapons, should be privately owned, and kept in a safe place according to common practice (set by the consensus of juries, not legislatures, whose job in common law is to set guidelines) , actual possession likely being in e.g. community armories. Such ownership serves as a valuable check against central ownership by tyrants and all that implies e.g. Chernobyl."

So if my dangerous property is kept in a "safe place", as determined by the local government/jury, do I really own it? I paid for it, so why can't I choose where to store it?

It's still, as far as I can tell, a restriction on personal freedom. Are you ok with a governing body determining how "safe" your property has to be before you're allowed to keep it where you want?

@Psychologic, I think if there's substantial and provable and reasonable risk involved on private property where human life is threatened, and creating a nuclear bomb would pose such a risk, then restrictions to personal freedom are reasonable.

I think the large distinction here is what the article above points out: that these restrictions should be "set by the consensus of juries, not legislatures, whose job in common law is to set guidelines."

I think what's important about the article above, which I haven't done any leg work to ensure any of it is accurate, is that creation of nuclear weapons currently is not illegal. And you don't see the what Libertarians term the "crazy evil Bill Gates" building an army of nukes or any nukes for that matter.

>> ^blankfist:

We want a lot of the same things, but your list isn't exactly accurate from my perspective, @NetRunner.

By my eye you ultimately agreed to everything I said. You'd probably have arguments with me about how to accomplish some of them (helping the poor would probably be our most striking divergence), but not very many arguments with me on most of them.

The environment is a broad category, but generally speaking the idea behind things like cap & trade is to bring the market externality of environmental damage into the market.

I'd much prefer creating a market for carbon credits to our current regime where we tell car companies what average MPG their vehicles have to achieve. I want to give people a market incentive to manage their emissions, rather than give them some arbitrary bar to hop over.

I've always thought that it's weird that conservatives and libertarians put up a fight with us on stuff like that. It seems like pure tribal animosity.

As for the drug thing, how can something be neither legal nor illegal? I'd say everything that's not illegal is by definition legal.

@NetRunner, I think the "how" is what is important. I know you want to do those damn carbon credits and make Al Gore rich, but that's exactly my issue with striking a common ground; it's never mutual, and it always comes with an asterisk.

To your point, maybe if something isn't illegal it's technically legal by definition, but I guess I was trying to say I'd prefer there not to be a law written granting us lowly serfs the right to put into our bodies what we choose.

Blankfist, do you feel that there should be any requirement to treat people who cannot pay for medical service? (I tried looking up the Libertarian perspective, but didn't come across anything useful in the short time that I looked.)

Car accidents and gunshot wounds come to mind, especially if the victim is unconscious. Of course the immediate presumption is that it would be taking place under something similar to our current system, so maybe there is an alternate Libertarian way of structuring health care provision to expediently accommodate those unable to pay.

Do you think the free market would handle the situation on its own? From my understanding of Libertarianism, it doesn't seem likely that they would want government providing the care or requiring private businesses to do so either.

>> ^blankfist:

@NetRunner, I think the "how" is what is important. I know you want to do those damn carbon credits and make Al Gore rich, but that's exactly my issue with striking a common ground; it's never mutual, and it always comes with an asterisk.

What would be a mutual "common ground" that doesn't "come with an asterisk"? If the word you're aiming for is compromise, it generally means both parties make a trade of some sort -- I sacrifice one element that's important to me, and you sacrifice an element that's important to you, so we can make a common agreement where we both get something we want.

It's been a long time since I've seen any conservative or libertarian who was willing to compromise with liberals at all, even on topics where there are common, achievable goals.

IMO, it's one of the core issues in America right now. I get the sense that conservatives believe that liberals should never be allowed to get anything they want, even when they win elections, and even when what they're proposing was originally proposed by conservatives (e.g. exchange-based HCR, cap & trade).

@NetRunner. Yes, Neoliberals are victims. Conservatives and Libertarians are the evil.

@Psychologic. What if there were people on the sidewalk who see a wounded man in the streets, yet decide selfishly not to help him or call emergency services? You would hope these people don't exist, and I'd argue that 99.99% of the time these people don't. But there's always the extreme circumstances we must cling to in fear that some policy be made to legislate against assholes and subhuman cretins.

The same goes for hospitals that would turn away a man with a gunshot wound. You would hope this wouldn't happen, but it's always possible. Humanity would prevail in all these scenarios, and at the very least the wounded would be brought back to a stable condition and patched up.

>> ^blankfist:

@NetRunner. Yes, Neoliberals are victims. Conservatives and Libertarians are the evil.

I didn't say evil, I said unwilling to compromise. For reference, see every conversation you've ever had with me.

PS: Neoliberal still doesn't mean what you want it to mean.